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Hive expansion update – we are live in Spain!

We are up and running in Madrid just in time for Q4. This milestone helps us give the brands we work with the best coverage across Europe.

Written by
Nicola Stebbing
Published on
October 12, 2022

Just in time for the busy Q4 with Black Week and the holiday sales, we have expanded to Spain. We kicked off operations in our fulfillment center in Madrid this week.

Following our expansion from Germany into France and Italy earlier this year, we have been working on covering Spain for the last few months. With a full team and space ready in Madrid, we are excited to be up and running.

Launching Spain is a great step towards even wider 2-day delivery coverage on the European mainland for D2C brands at local costs.

Why we expanded to Spain (and why you should, too)

Expanding to Spain has always been part of our mission to serve merchants across the EU and reach consumers quickly, sustainably, and at low cost to our brands.

Spain is one of the fastest growing e-commerce markets in the EU 

With a revenue of USD 27.2 billion in 2021, Spain is one of the largest e-commerce markets in Europe, just ahead of Italy. The 30 million e-commerce users make up 60 percent of the population. This number is expected to grow by 6 percent year-on-year, which equals the global average expected ecommerce growth until 2025.

The main e-commerce industries in Spain and their percentage to revenue:

  • Fashion (27%)
  • Electronics (25%)
  • Food & Personal Care (19%)
  • Toys etc. (17%)

Many of the brands we work with are already shipping to Spain, others are looking into building a Spanish community as they do not want to miss out on such a promising market.

Why Madrid?

Madrid is strategically well located in the center of the country and comes with very good infrastructure. Its proximity to Portugal is another plus.

Using Madrid as our base in Spain allows us to get good coverage for the whole country. This helps our merchants keep their delivery time and costs down as they pay local delivery prices.

With a lot of top talent being located in Madrid, we are happy to announce some of them are working for Hive from a beautiful office in the city center, only a 20-minute drive from our fulfillment space in Coslada – just outside the city. 

Having Hive staff in such close proximity and working on the floor of the fulfillment center means we can ensure the highest quality processes and continuously test and improve.

Hive team members putting in the work and making great memories in the Madrid fulfillment center

What is Hive pan-EU and how does it benefit you?

Expanding to Spain gets us one step further in our pan-European fulfillment coverage. Offering the brands we work with our Hive Pan-EU fulfillment solution gives them access to:

  • 2-day delivery in major EU markets
  • Local delivery costs
  • Automated inventory distribution at no extra effort to them
  • Smooth internationalization with a team of experts for each market
  • Hive fulfillment staff on the ground ready to react to any changes
  • Sustainable delivery and packaging options across the EU

This is a great milestone and one we are extremely proud of. But our expansion is not stopping here. With further locations on the horizon already such as the UK, we are excited for what the future holds.